It is advisable for the agricultural manager to have an efficient manure handling system in order to make efficient use of labor while optimizing disposition of manure. Since under certain weather conditions, manure should not or cannot be applied to the farm land, a holding area or station is necessary and an efficient means to get the manure from the collection area to the holding area as needed. Typical holding areas include earth basins, silos, storage platforms and the like located remote from the collection area at distances of up to 300 feet or more.
Typical manure handling systems can include large piston manure transfer pumps. These pumps can be installed above or below floor level and include a hopper to receive the manure at a collection point. Manure is loaded into the hopper with a tractor scraper or from a barn cleaner conveyor or the like. Such pumps can be of the hollow piston variety, for example, see U.S. Pat. No. 3,872,981 to Hedlund issued Mar. 25, 1975, or more commonly, of the solid piston variety. For example, see U.S. Pat. No. 3,103,276 to Schmitzer issued Sept. 10, 1963. In such pumping systems the collection hopper discharges into a pumping chamber of the pump. The pump piston moves the manure out of the pumping chamber, usually through a discharge valve to a discharge pipe where the manure is carried to a holding station. The pistons and corresponding pumping chambers generally are cylindrical although some have a rectangular or square cross-sectional configuration thus necessitating a transition zone to the round discharge pipe.
A common difficulty experienced with such systems is the propensity of somewhat fluid manure mixture to freeze in the system in cold weather. An additional difficulty can occur when the system has a transition from a rectangular or non-circular pumping chamber to a circular discharge pipe. Stagnant areas are apt to develop and collect manure and self-cleaning of the system is not likely. Additional difficulty occurs with bridging, especially when the manure has a high straw content.